4/23 - NHTI-Delta Dental 5k Road Race

Today was a beautiful Friday and although I was feeling a bit down and out after going out for my friend's birthday last night, I was determined to do some sort of workout. Originally I was thinking 6xMile at 10k pace or something to that effect. I called up Sam Wood on my way to Keene to see if he wanted to take part and he invited me over to Concord with him and Abbey Gossling for the NHTI-Delta Dental 5k.

Soon upon arrival I noticed several of the usual suspects in the Concord road racing scene - Scott Clark, Chris Mahony, Tim Cox, Mackenzie Kilpatrick - to name a few. Beginning the warm-up I could already feel my calf and it was giving me shooting pain just where the calf muscle inserts behind the knee. For a few days I've been dealing with this problem. It seems like I have some serious muscle imbalances in my right leg causing me to limp and compensate. The problem is made worse by a slow-healing wound in my achilles tendon from a new pair of asics I bought which were a full size too big. I can't pinpoint the source of the issue. All I know is it HURTS.

I warmed up more casually than usual, threw on some flats and did a few strides. The pain in my calf subsided, albeit temporarily, and I jogged to the start line. The course was really cool - it had a fun cross country element but also spent about a mile on the roads. The race went out quick but comfortably (4:56) but the timer at the mile mark scared me when he called 4:46. I knew the mile markers had to be off when we hit 2 miles at 10:20. No matter how slow I've run 5k, I don't believe I've ever run a middle mile in 5:34! I was mostly dueling with a young looking guy whom I didn't recognize. It turned out he's a talent hailing from Saint Paul's School and he definitely was the home-town favorite. In the last half-mile I turned it on and took the win decidedly in 15:48. Results.

Overall, this was a good race for me. I felt nearly effortless for a majority of the race and was surprised to have so few runners challenging up front. I was impressed by the second runner's efforts to shake up the pace, using surges and accelerating into turns. Focusing on the competitive strategy of a race is something I hadn't had the fitness to do in some time, and it felt good to focus on the race with that lens.